Collaborative Action: Addressing Toxic Stress and ACES - Highlighting Efforts

First 5 Placer Network works to address and prevent ACES in Placer and promote resiliency. The First 5 Network includes many of non-profit agencies, schools, and medical providers working collaboratively on this important work to promote healthy child development. This article is to highlight the work that our partner Tahoe Forest Health System

is doing in order to address ACEs and preventing toxic stress. Please see the excerpt below.

Truckee-Tahoe ACEs Aware

In February 2021, a team of community partners was awarded a grant to support the planning and development of a Trauma-Informed Network of Care within the Truckee North Tahoe region. The leadership team includes Tahoe Forest Health System, Truckee Tahoe Unified School District, Placer County Public Health Division, Nevada County Behavioral Health, Gateway Mountain Center, Sierra Community House and the Community Collaborative of Tahoe Truckee. These partners have a successful history of collaboration on many health-related issues, ranging from mental/behavioral health to immunizations to equity, and have been applying elements of ACE-related work and resilience building practices within our respective organizations for many years. As individual organizations, we are positioned to move towards a more formalized Network of Care by implementing ACE screenings along with follow up and bi-directional information sharing. Each organization provides a different and complementary perspective on what a Trauma-Informed Network of Care looks like in practice. If anything, it is the differences that each agency brings to the table that are helping us move closer to our shared goals of reducing toxic stress and supporting community members.

Currently, the leadership team is focusing on:

· improving medical provider training around ACEs and trauma informed care,

· establishing workflows for ACE screenings and follow up,

· establishing clear, person-centered processes of bi-directional referrals and linkage between agencies,

· identifying and implementing targeted trainings for all school personnel,

· identifying education needs around ACEs to inform outreach and provide trainings for the general community,

· and evaluating the feasibility of an internet-based, bi-directional referral platform to support client linkage to services.

This project is made possible by the ACEs Aware Trauma-Informed Network of Care Planning Grant through the Office of the California Surgeon General.